Storenvy founder shares story of seed round, Y Combinator rejection

We recently reported on the news of former Kansas City-startup now San Francisco-based Storenvy‘s $1.5 million round of capital. In our post, we conducted an interview with CEO and founder Jon Crawford (see our post: “Former KC startup Storenvy nabs $1.5 million“). His startup’s story is full of twists and turns in just a short time (founded in 2008). Crawford has gone through the loss of co-founders, the relocation of his startup, and the acceptance plus removal from the esteemed Y Combinator program. Last week, Crawford gave a first-hand account of his tale on his blog, diving into the ups and downs of his entrepreneurial journey.

In 2008, I founded Storenvy, a social e-commerce platform that gives people free and easy online stores that look great. The unique thing about it is that it’s all built around community, and we combine all the stuff from the stores into one big social shopping marketplace for everything. Think of it as “Tumblr for e-commerce”. (We’re hiring!)

In 2010, I got accepted and kicked out of Y Combinator, lost my cofounders, and raised $1.5M from A-list investors. This is my story.